Orientalists formally abandoned their field’s name yet kept using it

Evidence

The confusion is readily apparent in a piece written by the historian Bernard Lewis, one of the foremost Orientalists of the twentieth century. In an attack on Edward Said’s Orientalism and on all critics of the discipline, he says that the “term ‘Orientalist’ was not (‘in the past’) as vague and imprecise as it appears now.” It is “by now … polluted beyond salvation … and had been in fact abandoned by those who previously bore it. This abandonment was given formal expression at the Twenty-ninth International Congress of Orientalists, which met in Paris in the Summer of 1973.” After a long debate in that congress over the designation and what it meant to the participants, the “institution was strong enough to prevent the dissolution of the congress.” The “movement to abolish the term ‘Orientalist’ was, however, successful.” In the last sentence of his diatribe, as indeed throughout the body of his text, Lewis nonetheless continues to use the term (arguing, interestingly, that the “most rigorous and penetrating critique of Orientalist, as of any other, scholarship has always been and will remain that of their fellow scholars, especially, though not exhaustively, those working in the same field”). — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 523 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

But what had he achieved? Have Orientalists changed their working practices? They have not, as Said made no positive suggestions as to how they should change those practices and, indeed, at several points he seemed to be suggesting that it was impossible to change. Were imperialists disturbed by Said’s book? It seems not. — Robert Irwin, For Lust of Knowing, 542 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Orientalists abandoned the term yet continued using it in practice — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism: A Critique of…, 523; Orientalism changed no scholarly practices and disturbed no imperialists — Robert Irwin, For Lust of Knowing: The Orientalists…, 542; The term orientalist was officially abolished at the 1973 Paris congress — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans: Interpreting…, 2069

Broader Connections

• Orientalists abandoned the term yet continued using it in practice #corroborates (0.97) — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 523
• Orientalism changed no scholarly practices and disturbed no imperialists #complicates (0.72) — Robert Irwin, For Lust of Knowing, 542